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The Balancing Act: Can You Have It All?

In 1987, I resigned from a blockbuster 11-year career at the premier investment banking firm of Goldman Sachs. I had gotten married in 1980 to a wonderful guy I worked with. We sat directly across from each other on the trading floor. We had been secretly dating for three years and so our engagement announcement was a tremendous shock to our colleagues. Unfortunately, we got divorced four years later when we figured out that while we loved being business colleagues, we were not in love. We continued to sit across from each other on the sales desk as we truly enjoyed working with each other. We even had "joint custody" of our teddy bear, Joe.

But then an interesting thing happened. My ex-husband immediately started dating lots of nice gals and I had no dates. But this allowed me to work longer hours. A year later, I became the comanager of the Money Market Sales Group in New York, which was the first time in Goldman’s history that a woman had been promoted to sales management. I was ecstatic. And since I didn’t have a social life, I started working on the weekends as well. My ex thought I was crazy to take on more responsibility on top of a full client load, and he thought it was amusing that I was now his boss.

For the next year while he dated, I worked. About six months after we split up, we decided to go out to dinner for old time's sake. I looked at my ex and said, "Gee, we seem to be having so much fun, do you think we'll ever get back together?" I might as well have hit him in the face with a bucket of ice water; he looked at me and said, "No way!" Although hurt, I had the courage to ask him why; he looked at me and said, "Because you're too old." At the time, I was 32 and he was 36. No one I've ever told this story to has understood why at that moment I thanked him. I thanked him because even though the message was brutal, it was the absolute truth. At that moment I knew there was a very low probability that I would ever get remarried as long as I worked all day and entertained clients most nights.

1. Mister Albert in 'The Color Purple'

After abusing wife Celie in every imaginable way (including isolating her from her beloved sister and making her fix up his gross living conditions and troll kids), Mister Albert moves his mistress into their house and makes Celie her servant. Perhaps the only bigger monster is Celie's stepfather, who gave her away to Mister Albert.

Photo: IMDB

2. Sheba Hart in 'Notes On A Scandal'

Good wives typically don't have sex with men other than their husbands, who are left home to take care of their kids (one of whom is disabled). Good wives also don't cheat on said husbands with boys. Who are underage. And their students. Seriously, if the genders were reversed in this, the world would have really been flipping out.

Photo: IMDB

3. Carlo Rizzi in 'The Godfather'

Carlo only married his wife, Connie, in hopes of taking over her family business. He also abuses her. Like, a lot.

Photo: IMDB

4. Ginger in 'Casino'

Ginger steals from her husband to fund and fuel her gambling and drug addictions. She also cheats on him with his business partner and at one point ties their daughter to her bed so she can go clubbing. Classy!

Photo: IMDB

5. Humbert Humbert in 'Lolita'

Generally, a good husband doesn't marry you just to leave you dead, then kidnap and continually rape your underage daughter. Just, you know, a rule of thumb.

6. Cora Smith in 'The Postman Always Rings Twice'

7. Earl Hunterson in 'Waitress'

Where do we begin with this one? Jenna has to initially hide her pregnancy from Earl Hunterson, which is generally never a good sign. She also hides some money from him to escape his controlling, sociopathic ways. He also threatens, once he does learn of her pregnancy, that she better not love their baby more than she loves him, and that he wants to use her money to get a Camcorder to make sex videos with her ... but only if she loses the baby weight. What a catch!

Photo: IMDB

8. Lenore in 'Taken' and 'Taken 2'

Famke Janssen's Lenore is still a b*tch to Liam Neeson's Bryan Mills even after he saves their family members from being abducted not once, but twice. Her particular set of skills apparently doesn't include being gracious.

Photo: IMDB

9. Jack Torrance in 'The Shining'

After lying about why he's in a remote Colorado hotel that may or may not contain ghosts that have sex with furries, Jack Torrance tries to murder his wife and child. Hot.

Photo: IMDB

10. Rose DeWitt Bukater in 'Titanic'

Everyone thinks Titanic is some great love story, but it's ultimately about an engaged woman who cheats on her fiancee with a broke dude, then lets the broke dude freeze to death in the ocean. Wonderful.

Photo: IMDB

11. Ennis Del Mar in 'Brokeback Mountain'

Good husbands generally don't bang other married dudes behind their wives' backs, then blame solely the other dude for their marital problems. That won't stop me from watching this movie in slow motion though.

Photo: IMDB

12. Gregory Anton in 'Gaslight'

Upon learning that his wife Paula is traumatized by her aunt's death, Gregory Anton uproots their family and moves into the same house where said aunt died. Then, he psychologically abuses Paula to the point of her doubting her own sanity ... and coining the term "gaslighting."

13. Lori in 'Total Recall'

14. Frank Bennett in 'Fried Green Tomatoes'

After Ruth escapes from Frank's abuse, he comes back ... and tries stealing their newborn baby. Seems kind of douchey, right?

Photo: YouTube

15. Suzanne in 'To Die For'

Suzanne was so motivated to advance in her career that she hired a gang to murder her husband. To be fair, that was probably much quicker than most divorces.

Photo: IMDB

16. Frank Fitts in 'American Beauty'

Listen, I get it. Repressed homosexuality is hard. I know. But it's no excuse to bully and abuse your wife and kid.

Photo: IMDB

17. Jenny in 'Forrest Gump'

After rejecting Forrest Gump for years and only pretending to give a sh*t when he gets shipped over to Vietnam, Jenny marries him. But only also after seeing him on TV and conveniently saying he's the father of her kid, which is at best anachronistic and at worst opportunistic.

Photo: IMDB

18. Jerry Lundegaard in 'Fargo'

When you're greedy enough to get your wife kidnapped (and, spoiler alert, eventually murdered) in hopes of her dad giving you $100K in ransom, you're probably not that emotionally invested in your marriage.

Photo: IMDB

19. Holly McClane in the 'Die Hard' Series

Holly Gennaro McClane is incredibly ungrateful and disrespectful to estranged (then ex-) husband John McClane throughout the entire Die Hard series, despite him saving her life multiple times, once barefoot. Holly McClane can die hard and go right to Hell.

Photo: IMDB

20. Guy Woodhouse in 'Rosemary's Baby'

Spoilers galore: Guy Woodhouse let Satan rape his wife so she'd give birth to the Anti-Christ and he'd get more acting work, then made her think she was crazy. If you don't think that's grounds for divorce, I don't know how to help you.

Photo: IMDB

After abusing wife Celie in every imaginable way (including isolating her from her beloved sister and making her fix up his gross living conditions and troll kids), Mister Albert moves his mistress into their house and makes Celie her servant. Perhaps the only bigger monster is Celie's stepfather, who gave her away to Mister Albert.